ABSTRACT

An adolescents’ nutritional status has important implications for his health, development ofseveral chronic diseases, and plays a key role in breaking the cycle ofmalnutrition. The study accessed the dietary practice, food security and anthropometric status ofin-school adolescents at MOUAU staff school. Cross sectional study design was adopted for the study. Multistage sampling technique was used to select 382 students that participated in the study. Data was obtained from the respondents with the use ofstructured questionnaire, background information of the subjects, anthropometry, dietary habit, food frequency questionnaire and dietary practices was collected using a specific questionnaire module and it was scored and graded. Descriptive statistics (frequency and Percentage) and Chisquare Correlation analysis was used to analyze the information gotten from the questionnaire. The data obtained was analysed using Statistical Package Service Software (SPSS) version 25.0 and result was presented in frequency table, mean and standard deviation. The results revealed that there were more males (51.0%) than females (49.0%). The fathers (68.3%) and mothers (67.8%) had tertiary education qualification. The results showed that about 47.9% ate two times, while more than half (52.1%) ofthe respondent skipped meals and less than half ofthe students attested that their eating habit changed a lot (39.3%). The result further showed that more than half (52.6%) of them were food secure, 13.4% ofthem were moderately/mildly food insecure while 34.0% ofthem were severely food insecure. It was observed that majority (64.7%) ofthem had normal height and half(50.0%) ofthe children had normal BMI for age. The study concludes that there was a significant relationship (p = 0.05) between dietary habits, food security and anthropometric status ofthe respondents. The study recommend that school authorities, non-governmental organization and health professionals can promote healthy living amongst adolescents by organizing workshops and seminars to create health care awareness amongst adolescents especially among food insecured adolescents.